Posted on 09/21/2024 3:21:14 PM PDT by Twotone
Senate Republicans met Tuesday for Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s weekly off-the-record members’ lunch. These meetings, along with regular Wednesday Steering Committee lunches, are among the few regular times when party senators gather in one room to set party policy and messaging.
There are few clearer windows into McConnell’s priorities than these lunches, and Tuesday did not disappoint: The RAND Corporation was invited to present its report on military spending and the potential need to raise taxes to increase the military percentage of the country’s GDP.
That’s right; that was the priority. It wasn’t the former president and Republican nominee, who over the weekend survived another assassination attempt. It wasn’t Donald Trump’s campaign focus on past tax cuts or promise of more to come. It wasn’t House Republicans’ strategic (if faltering) election play to link the SAVE Act to a six-month spending resolution or even the threat of a bloated omnibus hanging over the Senate’s own head. It was more money for the Pentagon. Keep in mind: The government runs out of funding at the end of the month, at midnight on Sept. 30 — or 12 days from now.
More money for the Pentagon, once a safe Republican issue, has fallen from favor with voters and members over the past four years in particular. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), Blaze News learned, pushed back, asking why the conference ought to spend time considering tax hikes (suggested in the report) to deliver billions to a politicized, incompetent Pentagon brass that has cratered recruitment numbers. To Lee’s point, Trump has vocally lashed out at unaccountable Pentagon leadership, pointing out in last week's debate that the Biden-Harris administration hadn’t fired a single person over the chaotic, deadly, and embarrassing retreat from Kabul.
But McConnell doesn’t share those concerns. Indeed, he’s made clear he intends to stay on in the Senate after stepping down from leadership this fall explicitly to fight for Pentagon priorities and continued funding for the war in Ukraine. Throughout the meeting, he reportedly waxed wistful about American defense spending as a percentage of GDP during World War II and other eras.
Senate-watchers can consider Tuesday’s lunch not simply a glimpse into a moment of McConnell’s priorities but a preview into his goals for this month’s spending fight — and his plans for the likely December spending deal that will follow. Keep an eye out for big promises to Pentagon brass, get ready to see South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham’s bill committing the United States to a decade of funding Ukraine’s war against Russia, and expect other moves to tie Trump’s hands on foreign policy should he win in November.
McConnell is trying to keep the Democrat majority in the Senate. He doesn’t want Trump to drain the swamp.
These MIC people are sick, as are our Zeepers. But something tells me, I’m repeating myself.
McConnell no longer has "skin in the game" except to act as either a kingmaker or a spoiler.
McConnell is past his expiration date.
-PJ
Pentagon funding, along with foreign aid, has transformed into massive slush funds for Congress and their allies.
There are a lot of our leaders who like wars. There are no wars in heaven. Perhaps they will have to go to the alternative for eternity.
He is as unpopular as Tony Fauci
McConnell and Grahamnesty - both wholly owned by the defense lobby. They could not care less about the debt, the border, or rampant crime.
Mitch needs to go away
Power hungry evil man. I hope he repents before it’s too late.
The same Pentagon that is trying to lower the number of straight white males in the military. I wouldn’t give them a dime until they rid themselves of the jerk offs who are responsible for DEI and the Afghan debacle.
Mitch McConnell believes that politics is a business and the purpose of business is to grow and become profitable. He is the perfect representative of the military industrial complex.
He is the swamp!
The federal government collects more than enough tax dollars to fund everything the vast majority of voters deem necessary. It could easily begin significantly reducing the federal debt and still “fund everything the vast majority of voters deem necessary”. Here’s a plan:
1 Eliminate ALL federal “grants” unless individually approved by congress and publicly signed by the president.
2 Carryover annually budgeted items with ZERO automatic increases.
3 Require any budget increase to be individually approved by congress and publicly signed by the president.
4 Cap ALL federal employee headcount numbers at the present number, and reduce that 1 for 1 for every retirement.
5 Stop all plans for any new buildings in the Washington DC area, and require placement of all future headquarter locations to be located at the geographic center of their effected area.
6 Eliminate ALL DEI ESG and other such racist policies from the entire federal budget and eliminate all budgeted funds for them. Allow the military to replace them with soldiers, marines, airmen, and space personnel, retaining budget cost for each new recruit.
Need to raise taxes to increase the military.
Never a word of gutting wasteful spending everyone gets to whack the cash.
McConnel always been a Rino and has the money to prove it.
His pal Biden winks
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